Editorial

Quotes Of The Week: Henry Has Lost His Va-Va Voom

The 'Hand' that rocked the game dominates the quotes this week but Jose still makes his obligatory appearance...

Nov 20, 2009 8:18:14 AM

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Thierry Henry (France)

Teams

They Say:

"If he supports Milan, then Pato is an interista... All jokes aside, I don't think Mario is responsible for this sort of thing, which I would call naive," Jose Mourinho laugh's off Mario Balotelli's Milan fan talk.

"To combine together in this action, it was a great moment. It will go down in history, but the most important thing remains that we have qualified.” France captain Thierry Henry thinks his part in William Gallas' goal will go down in history. It sure will. Hero to zero in the blink of an eye. Va-va-voom! Cheat.

I'm very sorry for 'Trap'. In terms of fair play, something went wrong. After the goal, [Henry] should have had the decency not to celebrate. Perhaps he would have done better to stay calm. France were lucky because they found an opponent that was very sporting, otherwise I think the match would have been stopped [due to protests]." Legendary Italian defender Fabio Cannavaro gives his take on the controversy that dominates football this week.

"I do not know if Thierry touched the ball with his hand. It went so fast. The only thing I saw was the ball that came to me." William Gallas gives his view of proceedings in Paris. The whole world saw it William, except the man that mattered, referee Marin Hansson.

"Thierry isn't a cheat but I cannot bring myself to celebrate the fact that we are in the World Cup because of how we got there. How can you be pleased with qualifying like this? I do believe that this thing he did will follow him for ever, wherever he goes," former team-mate and dive prone midfielder Robert Pires says Henry isn't a cheat. Sure Robert, handling the ball isn't cheating. Maybe he's looking for a job with FIFA when he retires? If he ever retires.

Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet saw fit to apologise to Ireland for the officials part in the shocking controversy:

"There are approximately 80 million Irishmen around the world. We guarantee they all feel pretty bad today. But I sincerely hope there are three Swedes that feel even worse. They are Martin Hansson and [referee's assistants] Stefan Wittberg and Fredrik Nilsson. There will be no World Cup for Ireland and I assume that Team Hansson has also forfeited its right to continue to take charge of major international matches." Do IKEA sell spectacles? I guess not.

Republic of Ireland manager Giovanni Trapattoni has lost faith in the integrity of the game he has spent a lifetime working in:

"If it was us? We would be as criticised as France. But when you have a great responsibility, we have to get rid of these situations. That is sport, that is fair play. We often speak of fair play, but now we cannot say to kids in school that football is disciplined."

Rafael Benitez doesn't mince his words on if Fernando Torres is sold by Liverpool: "I'm confident it will never happen. If it did, I'd resign." So the Americans might kill two birds with one stone, more cash and less Rafa.

"I think it was a bad tackle and sometimes when you play friendly games for your country you should have more respect for each other. Hopefully it won't happen in the future." Dutch star Dirk Kuyt was not impressed with Italy's tackling in last week's 'friendly' which left Robin van Persie with a nasty injury.

"Joining City is not something that will ever happen. When you have got red blood you can not see yourself with blue blood. You go there and they have blue ketchup, it's just like 'what are they doing?!'" Phil Neville insists he still bleeds Red, which shouldn't make him too popular on the Blue side of Merseyside. Blue ketchup? What?

"I must confess [Amauri's situation] makes me annoyed. I can understand if someone is half Brazilian and half Italian, but it's another matter when he is not Italian in any way," Sampdoria striker Giampaolo Pazzini doesn't agree with Juventus' Brazilian Amauri playing for Italy and later defended his comments.

"Regarding Amauri, I don't want any controversy - I just told the truth and all hell broke loose."

We Say:

"Thierry Henry is a fraudster, huckster, cheat and charlatan and he is the only reason why the Republic of Ireland will not be playing at the World Cup next summer. Except he's not." Peter Staunton delves a little deeper into Ireland's exit from the World Cup. Maybe Henry was trying to develop a hybrid sport of Gaelic football mixed with football, let's call it Gallic football.

"It's the Emperor's New Clothes writ backwards: we have seen, but must say that we have not. And all because referees are left to do an impossible, thankless task as the all-seeing eye of the camera sits by to judge, but not to aid," Ewan MacDonald says the game at present facilitates cheating and Henry is ultimately not to blame.

Ewan was on a roll as he surveyed FIFA's paltry 'punishment' for Diego Maradona's obscene Argentina press conference last month. I spy a common denominator, mismanagement by the games governing body.

"Any football related activity? Will FIFA tap his phone to ensure that he's not working along with his scouts? Shall goons ransack his Playstation collection to remove all traces of PES and FIFA as a teary-eyed Kun and Giannina look on? Will an intern be dispatched from Zurich to Diego's house to commandeer the remote control on Sunday afternoons?"

You Say:

"Argentina's a big fish. The better's 4th favorite to win the WC. FIFA does not go after big fish." The prophetic Dot offered this on Diego's punishment, three days before anothre big fish cheated their way to teh World Cup finals. What are Saturday's lottery numbers Dot??

"The world should unite and force fifa to replay the match!" Sean on Earth ranks a France-Ireland replay above world peace and global warming.

Ahmed in Kurdistan "Shame on you henry."

Jon in Canada calls what everyone sees, "Wow... I feel really sorry for Ireland with that blatant handball from Henry that led to the goal. To bad. Go anybody but France. Cheaters." No sympathy necessary Jon, just fair play.

"I think Domenech's voodoo is finally paying dividends…" Carlo in Rome, takes a more light-hearted view. That is funny. Any chance Raymond would get the voodoo people to tidy up his unsightly eyebrows?

"I think i have to agree with Pazzini...its like Almunia, he should not play for England...its so wrong changing nationality like this," Forza Roma Capitano agrees with Pazzini's comments.

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